Turkey’s Cartoonists Beleagured Yet Defiant — Jonathan Guyer

“Every cartoonist I interviewed in Turkey told me that 2016, irrespective of the recent coup and crackdown, has been the most difficult year for cartoonists on record” — Jonathan Guyer

“Turkey has one of the most advanced comic scenes in the world . . . It has a half-dozen weekly comic magazines, plus political cartoons are just huge in the daily newspapers, online, Facebook, Twitter,” says journalist Jonathan Guyer.

Guyer told Public Radio International: “Literally from the day after the coup, cartoonists in Turkey have been hitting quite hard against their president . . . The cartoonists are not softening their radical message. They’re acting as ombudsmen and holding the government to account.”

Guyer recently spent a month in Istanbul researching the cartoon scene, departing days before the July 15 failed coup against President Recip Tayyip Erdogan. His complete PRI interview can be heard here. Jonathan Guyer’s comprehensive report about the state of political cartooning in Turkey is available at the Institute of Worls Affairs website.